Venison Meat: Should You Age Your Venison Meat?

Every time I talk to a hunter's spouse, I hear stories about a deer hanging in the garage or the backyard for a week while it ages. But do you always need to age the meat? The answer is that it depends on the deer.

How old the deer was will impact the taste of the meat, and determine whether you need to age it, which improves the tenderness and flavor of the meat. If you've got a yearling, you can eat it immediately; it doesn't need to age at all-think spring lamb or veal. You can do anything you want with this meat! The older animals, like the 10-point trophy buck, are tough-can you imagine eating a 7 year-old cow? These older animals need to go through an aging process in order to make good eating.

There is some debate over how long you need to age your venison. But it really comes down to how big and old the animal was.

Most hunters age their meat by hanging the carcass in the garage or a shed and letting it sit. While the U.S. Department of Agriculture wouldn't approve of this, it works if the temperatures are cold enough. When aging, you must keep the meat between 32F and 40F and keep it dry-bacteria will grow if the meat is warmer than 40F and has any moisture in it.

We don't have any place to age meat at our house, which is fine since we actually rarely do it. However, if my husband gets a buck that needs some aging, he quarters the deer and puts the meat in coolers with dry ice for a few days, which is sufficient for the does. For the bucks, we borrow our friend's aging refrigerator and let the meat sit there for a week or so. Then we process it as usual.

Submitted By: Susan L. Rose